White Wind Blew Read Online Free Page B

poured into a clean glass and took with him to the piano. To hell with the Klan’s new agenda. It was a quarter past two in the morning and he needed a drink. Plenty of time to lose himself in his work. The ink on the yellow pages had long dried. He read now what he’d composed just before midnight, then crumpled the page into a ball and tossed it into the wastebasket. There were simply not enough notes.
    He dipped the tip of the quill into the inkwell above the piano keys and stared at the blank page. He realized how much he must look like his father, sitting in that position; he used to watch his father writing like this at night, always by candlelight and always with a quill pen. “Fountain pens dampen creativity,” his father had once said.
    Wolfgang shook his head. Focus on the music.
    He dipped his quill and found the page, searching back for his train of thought: Oh, yes, violins and the clarinet.

Chapter 3
    Wolfgang heard footsteps in the dark, her careful tiptoes creaking over wooden floorboards, and seconds later he couldn’t breathe. He inhaled, but the air just froze deep down until he thought his chest would implode. Patches of light and dark flashed across his vision. He fought with his arms, but couldn’t push her away. He pleaded for his legs to come alive so that he could run from the bed, from her, but he felt nothing down there. Screams sounded from deep inside his head, vibrations that dampened with every frantic beat of his heart.
    Car tires screeched.
    He pulled his knees up to his chest, and finally the whistling of a chorus of birds woke him.
    “Rose…”
    Wolfgang opened his eyes, panting. It was only a dream. Another nightmare.
    He sat up straight and yawned, staring out the broken window, spotting three of the noisy birds perched on a low branch of an oak tree that still carried brown leaves throughout the winter. It was freezing inside; no surprise, given the state of the window that he’d neglected to board up before he’d fallen asleep. He rubbed his arms and stood, accidentally knocking over an empty wineglass.
    His right knee ached. He massaged the muscles, eyeing the stack of theology books next to the piano as he stretched. It had been his ritual to study them every morning before work, but with as late as he’d been staying at the sanatorium and as many hours as he’d been putting in on his writing, it had been several days since he’d opened them. But those were excuses and he knew it. With the special privileges the monks at Saint Meinrad had given him, the books deserved his full attention. And they would get it. But not this morning.
    Dozens of his papers had blown from the piano and were now scattered all over the floor. His head throbbed as he bent over to collect them, his cold fingers clumsy against the hardwood. He gathered the papers into a stack, put them into a black lacquered box atop the piano, and slid it under the bed.
    It was six thirty. His patients would be waiting.
    ***
    Wolfgang dressed in a black Roman cassock that buttoned down the front from neck to toe and covered it with a white lab coat. He heard a gentle tapping on his front door. And then a female voice.
    “Wolfgang.”
    Susannah was here.
    “I’m coming.” Stopping by the kitchen, Wolfgang knelt down to see his distorted reflection in the glass of the coffee percolator. He stood back up, somewhat satisfied.
    She knocked again. “Wolfgang.”
    He smiled. Truly she harassed him on purpose. So went the morning ritual. He grabbed his black bag of musical instruments, straightened his lab coat, and opened the door. It was cool outside, sun-drenched.
    Susannah waited at the bottom of his steps, gripping a small black purse. She smiled. “Morning, Wolf.”
    “Morning, Susannah.” Together they walked up toward the trees. Under the sunlight, Wolfgang finally felt that warmth he’d been craving. “You sleep well?”
    “I did. You?”
    “I don’t sleep, Susannah. You know that.”
    They walked